Santiago y el Viaje

Just a couple more pics of Santiago and the amazing bus ride to Mendoza. The up loader for pics doesn't seem to be working so i'll have to do this a different way...

The last week of Santiago there were only a few days that were nice. One day I managed to go out while it stopped raining and I went to el Museo de la Memoria. The building was pretty cool but because of the earthquake almost the entire museum was closed.



After that I started to walk to the museum of Pablo Neruda's house but it started pouring rain so I decided to wait until the next day to see it. The house on the right side was just part of his house... it is actually 3 different buildings that you have to access by going outside. When he was living there, there was rivers flowing right outside his windows and he had bridges over them to get from one section of his house to another.



I wasn't allowed to take pics of the inside but it was really cool. He was a huge fan of the ocean (even though he couldn't swim and sailing made him sick) and he made his house to resemble a ship. He has 3 different houses in Chile and all 3 are completely different. It would be cool to see the others but I am going to head to warmer weather...

Here are a couple buildings, damage from the earthquake and a few views from Santiago after the rain took a break.









On the bus ride from Santiago to Mendoza (11 hours rather than the 6 it took the first time) the sky was absolutely amazing and the snow covered mountains couldn't even come close to being captured on a camera.



Tomorrow I am going to take a night bus to Buenos Aires. I think I might buy a guitar in BA if I can find a decent cheap one... It would be nice to be able to play while traveling around but is going to suck to have to carry a guitar around. I'll probably stay in BA for 4 or 5 days before heading to Iguazu. Really looking forward to seeing Iquazu.

Santiago

I have been in Santiago for a little over a week now. I think I am going to stay until Friday and then head to Buenos Aires. I changed my return flight and will be returning to the states on August 18th. That means I have a little less than 2 months left. I am going to try and make it up to Ecuador and Columbia after I see part of Brazil. I am pretty sick of cold weather so I really want to get up north as soon as possible.

I like Santiago ok... I'm not much of a city person but as far as cities go it seems like a nice city. There are a lot of really old buildings that are pretty cool.







And this art museum had a lot of old photos of Santiago with these same buildings in the photos. My camera battery died right after I took this picture so I didn't get any more of the museum or the stuff in the museum... hmph.



I went to the top of a viewpoint in Santiago... it was a great view of the city... and the smog.



But if you pretend it is just clouds its actually quite beautiful.



Yesterday I went to a vineyard and did wine tasting. It was pretty cool but I wish we could have learned a little more about the process of making wine. Also, we only got to try 2 different types of wine... nonetheless, the building was really old (1886) and cool and it was a fun trip.









While that other stuff was really cool... this is how they actually do it now. Kinda takes away from the whole romantic feeling doesn't it?



I think I might go to a few more museums in Santiago before I leave so I will probably make another post of Santiago. Then after that the plan is to go Buenos Aires, Iguazu Falls, Rio De Janeiro, and the Pantanal. Then after that make my way as quick as possible across Bolivia and Peru up to Ecuador and spend the rest of my trip in Ecuador and Columbia. We'll see how long I can stick to a plan... i'm not so good at making plans...

City of Color

I just got to Santiago, Chile after staying in Valparaiso for 3 days... I think it was my favorite city so far. The weather was shit and we almost got robbed but the colors and artwork in the city were absolutely amazing. I could walk around this city for a year and always find something new to look at and never get bored.

I didn't take any pictures of Mendoza... I didn't spend very much time there and there really wasn't much to take pics of. I mean, it was a nice enough city just nothing really amazing. I did go horseback riding which I haven't done since I was really young so that was really fun.



After Mendoza I took a bus to Santiago and crossed the boarder into Chile. Although I thought I lost my passport (I found it... no worries), the pass was pretty amazing.



We went straight to Valparaiso after getting to the bus terminal in Santiago. It was only another ~2 hours so we figured it would be easier w/o knowing Santiago just to hang out in Valparaiso for awhile. Like I said, Valparaiso was absolutely amazing... I had a hard time walking down the streets because I would stop so much to look at/take pics of all the artwork. There were so many hidden paths w/ staircases and all kinds of different artwork all over the place. I'll try to minimize the number of pics I post but it is really hard for me. Hah.























I am now in Santiago and just got in about an hour ago. I am going to hopefully meet up w/ Tamara tonight or tomorrow... this city is really big so I think it will be good to have a friend here to show me around. I am really excited to see her!

After Santiago I think I will go back to Mendoza for a little while and then go straight to Buenos Aires from there. I haven't completely planned the rest of my trip but I believe I am going to come back to the States around the end of July or beginning of August... I think that will give me enough time to see more of Argentina, some of Brazil, and then get back to Lima for my flight.

Bye Sucre!

Well I am now in Mendoza, Argentina! Took a solid 3 days of non-stop travel to get here... wasn't so bad though, I slept really well on the train the first night and on the bus the second night.

Anyways, before I left Sucre I saw this really cool fountain show that they do every week just down the street from my house. They had live music too but I couldn't get any pics because it was pretty dark. The pictures don't really do this justice because part of what was so cool was how the water moved.... anyways...







Last weekend I went on a 2 day hike. The first day we hiked to a small town called Managua that was built inside a crater that was formed by a volcanic explosion.

We started at this old church.


And then just past the church there is an old trail from the Spanish that was built in the 1500's that we hiked down. The trail goes down into this valley.




There was some cool stuff along the way. Some rivers and a lot of old farm houses.


The people at this farm really liked us I think... one gentleman even threw a rock at us to show how much he liked us (thanks Evo).


Yeah, I guess it isn't very safe hiking through the "campo" here because the Bolivian president has created some tension between the farmers and the city people. We had a good guide that spoke Quechua so I think we were fairly safe... he told us when to hurry past a pueblo and when to be quite and sneaky so that the people wouldn't hear that we were around (lol).

This is the CITY of Managua and a pic of the hostel we stayed at. The hostel was insanely nice but even though it was all set up for electricity the power line hadn't been run to the town yet so we just had candles. The town was supposed to have a bunch of artisan crafts that you could buy but the town was still celebrating a holiday so they were all drunk (and no, i'm not exaggerating... they really were ALL drunk).







Me drinking the chicha... I had to try it...... I think I paid for it this last week. That's what I get for drinking out of a huge rusted barrel that smelled (and tasted) like cow piss.



Later that evening we hiked up to an old graveyard on top of a plateau. Most of the graves were fairly new though... I think the old ones didn't have any time markers. They did however seem to have moved some bodies because there were TONS of human bones all over the ground.




Another view of the valley we stayed in the first night... this is taken from up at the graveyard.


Ugh, getting tired of doing this... just going to post the rest of my pics. On the second day we got to see dinosaur footprints which were absolutely awesome. These ones are raptor tracks... there were also some bigger ones but they weren't as clear as these so I just decided to post the better pics. These are from the second day:







This is just taken from the car on the way back to town. There was a market just on the outside of town.


Anyways, like I said, I am now in Mendoza. I took a 9 hour bus ride Friday morning, an 8 hour train ride Friday night into Saturday, a 7 hour bus ride Saturday day, and an 18 hour bus ride Saturday night into Sunday. It wasn't as bad as it sounds really... I slept both nights really well and managed to have the seat open next to me most of the trip. Going to stay here in Mendoza for about a week I think and then head to Santiago.